Do Acid Reflux Remedies Work?

Acid reflux suffers disillusioned with antacid and OTC drugs are seeking relief through natural remedies. Discover if they can end your suffering.

With more of us leading increasingly stressful lives and eating on the go, it’s no wonder the rates of acid reflux are on the rise. This common condition affects both men and women and acid reflux in children, is becoming a serious issue. The cause can linked to the health of our digestion, because that is where most of our diseases and ailments occur.

Do Acid Reflux Medication Work?

The rise in the number of acid reflux sufferers has created a huge market of over the counter (OTC) drugs and medications, that claim to alleviate the symptoms such as chest pain and heartburn. The problem with these types of acid reflux remedies, is that they rarely work and are only a short term fix. There is also the concern of potential side effects, that are often associated with pharmaceutical drugs and medicine.

Many of these OTC or prescription medications are designed to reduce the amount of acid in your stomach. By doing so, they can help relieve the symptoms of acid reflux or GERD.

Too much acid in the stomach, is often blamed for many digestive disorders. However, what many people don’t realize, is that too little stomach acid is even worse. Low acid can actually trigger many of the symptoms associated with indigestion and heartburn. It can also lead to more serious health conditions as well.

Low levels of stomach acid can mean the food you eat is not digested properly. Undigested food will begin to ferment in the gut and become toxic. The bad bacteria feeds on this fermentation by-product and increases the risk of gut infections and other chronic digestive disorders. Also – the bodies reaction to having too little acid is to increase it.

Focus On Why You Have Too Much Acid

The increase of acid reflux can be linked to more of us eating an unhealthy diet, that contains too much fat, sodium, sugar, chemicals and artificial additives. These foods over tax our digestive system – smoking and drinking alcohol creates further strain.

Even certain healthy foods such as oranges and tomatoes, are not good for your acid reflux.

All these foods have one thing in common – they are acid forming. This means they irritate the gentle lining of the stomach wall, which triggers the stomach to produce more acid. This has the knock on effect of increasing the acidic levels in your blood. Growing research indicates people with acidic blood are more prone to illness.

To counteract this acidity, you should consider adapting your lifestyle to incorporate more natural acid reflux remedies. This can begin by gradually introducing more high fibre food into your diet. Foods such as these increase the levels of alkaline in your body. Alkaline neutralizes acid and makes your acidity levels more balanced.

Alkaline forming foods include most vegetables, salad and fruits apart from olives, asparagus and broad beans. Nuts are another good source of alkaline forming foods however, avoid eating hazelnuts and walnuts.

Caffeinated drinks such as tea or coffee or acid forming therefore, consider replacing these with herbal teas such as chamomile tea. However, avoid peppermint tea because this tends to relax your esophagus which can increase the symptoms acid reflux.

Many people suffering discomfort from acid reflux, have found relief after swallowing apple cider vinegar before their meals.

How You Chew Is Just As Important As What You Eat

How you eat your food, has also a huge impact on your digestion. These days, it seems that we are leading increasingly stressful lives, where time always seems to be in short supply. We tend to rush things, including the way we eat.

Many of us gulp our food down without hardly ever chewing it. This undigested food ends up in our stomach where it overworks our digestive system – putting it under greater pressure. Over time, this leads to many digestive disorders, including gut infections and the increased risk of colon related cancer.

For this reason, it is important to chew your food thoroughly. You should chew your food at least 50 times, until it becomes a smooth paste. If you are used to gulping down food, this will take practice – but the benefits it will do for your digestion will be huge.

The Importance Of Digestive Enzymes

Another issue with excessive acid, is that it can destroy vital digestive enzymes. These are needed to break down food and make it more absorbent for the body. Natural enzymes can be found in raw fruit and vegetables, however in their raw form, they can be very difficult to break down, especially if you have a digestive disorder like acid reflux disease. A great solution to this problem, is to take a quality dietary supplement to boost your levels of these important digestive enzymes.

Unfortunately, many of the digestive enzyme supplements on the market do not contain natural enzymes from fruit or vegetables. Most are protein based or derived from psyllium husk, which are not as effective. Natural enzymes are notoriously hard to preserve and it does not help matters, that many supplement producers use high temperature processes, that easily destroy these enzymes.

However, this problem has been solved by MaxaLife and their digestive health supplement MX Kiwi Biotic, which is made from 100% pure kiwifruit. The potent digestive enzymes within the fruit, are carefully extracted using a water based filtration process, that involves no chemicals or solvents. This results in a quality supplement, with a higher concentration of digestive enzyme activity.

MX Kiwi Biotic is also high in prebiotics, which help the friendly bacteria digest food more efficiently and by doing so, creates a healthier and more balanced digestive system.